California governor race 2014: Ex-TARP official eyes Brown challenge

Former Treasury Department official and TARP administrator Neel Kashkari is likely to run for governor of California as a Republican in 2014 and has begun the process of gathering advisers for an anticipated campaign, POLITICO has learned.

As President George W. Bush’s assistant Treasury secretary for financial stability, Kashkari was the lead official tasked with overseeing the 2008 bank bailouts. He left the investment firm PIMCO earlier this year, citing a desire to continue a career of public service.

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Republican sources say Kashkari, 40, has not made a final decision to run for governor and he is not expected to attend the Republican Governors Association retreat in Arizona this month. But he is already taking counsel from a group of experienced California hands, including strategist Aaron McLear, media consultant Todd Harris and pollster Neil Newhouse and his firm Public Opinion Strategies.

Reached by phone, McLear offered only this comment on Kashkari’s intentions: “Neel has been traveling the state talking to Californians about the challenges they face and to determine how he can best help.”

Kashkari has made no secret of his interest in pursuing elected office at some point. He has spent much of 2013 touring the state and his Twitter feed includes photos of him picking crops in Salinas, visiting a homeless shelter in Sacramento and speaking to students in East Palo Alto.

Kashkari has also met with Republican donors to assess the financial viability of a campaign, and sources said that Republicans in Kashkari’s orbit had begun reaching out to possible campaign aides, though no one has yet been hired.

Republicans face steep odds in the California gubernatorial race: In 2010, Democrats won every statewide office there despite a national GOP wave and a lavishly-funded campaign for governor by billionaire eBay alum Meg Whitman.

But rebuilding and rebranding the California GOP has to start somewhere, and some in the party believe an unconventional candidate like Kashkari could help start that process with a sober and policy-driven campaign.

On his website, Kashkari names education and economic growth as areas where Californians ought to be dissatisfied with their government. “Unfortunately today California 8th graders rank 49th in student achievement while a devastating 21% of Californians are either out of work or underemployed,” he writes on the candidate-style web page. “And Sacramento’s budget ignores literally hundreds of billions of dollars of liabilities.

Two other Republicans have already announced for the 2014 race: former Lt. Gov. Abel Maldonado and Assemblyman Tim Donnelly. Neither is viewed as a formidable contender.

A USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll this week suggested that there could be an opening for someone to challenge incumbent Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown: Though Brown won positive job approval marks from 55 percent of California voters, only 32 percent said they would favor reelecting the long-serving California politician in 2014.

But Brown has not drawn an opponent from within his own party and already has more than $10 million in the bank for an expected reelection bid in the solidly Democratic state.

Should Kashkari follow through with a 2014 bid, he would join a short list of big-state gubernatorial candidates seeking to leverage their personal profiles to compete in difficult political territory. Democrats have recruited two such candidates in large, Republican-leaning states: Texas state Sen. Wendy Davis and Georgia state Sen. Jason Carter, the grandson of former President Jimmy Carter.